The Schizophrenic's Daughter III
by VT Arkens
Summary: Free from Aperture at last, Doug is trying his best to help Breanna get settled back into her body. When something unforeseeable happens, it could easily cost Doug his sanity, and others their lives.
1. Chapter 1: Home

**I told myself I wouldn't but, here is the third (And final, I promise!) installment of _The Schizophrenic's Daughter_! I'll thank people as I go alone, as not to spoil anything!**

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><p>The relentless chatter was interrupted not by Miss Maken's attempt at teaching a Biology lesson, but the vice principal saying he had to talk to her. Once it was done, Miss Maken nodded and the vice principal spoke to someone in the hall as she addressed the class. "We're going to be getting a new student today, so I want you all to make her feel welcome. We don't want a repeat of last time." There were some comments from some of the students, laughter mostly. On that note, a girl entered the room, her raven-coloured hair cut at chin level and at an angle, shorter in the back than the front. She shifted her weight from one leg to the other, as if she weren't quite comfortable to being in her own body. "Breanna, you can go sit at the back table there."<p>

The lone boy at said table looked up from his notebook, a piece of his blonde hair falling in front of his eye. Why did she have to sit there? He was fine alone. He preferred it, actually. But the girl walked over anyway- rather awkwardly if you really looked- and took a seat. Her hands stayed active, her fists clenching and unclenching. The boy stole a glance at her, but kept it to that.

"You're very good." Her voice was low both in pitch and volume. "The drawing, I mean." He looked at the sketch of skulls and random swirls of black in the notebook.

He finally looked up at her, and he saw her shockingly blue eyes fixed on the the pencil marks. "Thanks." He wanted her to shut up. To leave before he said something stupid.

But this strange girl didn't stop there. "My father's an artist. Your style reminds me of his."

He didn't really have much to say, so he said the only thing that came to his mind. "My name's West."

He hated his name, but Breanna smiled. "Pleasure."

She'd been so close to calling herself the wrong name. It sounds odd, but she had good reason. She'd known herself as B for so long, she sometimes forgot that she even had a full name. She hadn't been back in her body for two weeks. It was a frightening experience to have been transferred to and from a machine. And when she'd regained her memories, her systems had shut down from the overload of information and emotional pain. But she'd refused to die. And her father had risked everything to get her back.

Breanna couldn't stop thinking about West for the rest of the day. Of all the new things she'd seen, he was the one thing that stuck in her head. Things were so different from the last time she'd been a student. If there was one thing she loved, it was her little silver iPod, a welcome back gift from her grandfather. She put in the earphones and began playing a song she hadn't heard in a long time.

"_You're asking me will my love grow,_

_I don't know, I don't know._

_Stick around, and it may show,_

_But I don't know, I don't know."_

She stepped off the bus and began her trek home. It was late in the school year, the calenders all reading May. But she had no trouble keeping up with the classes. Her eyes moved to the sky and she smiled. That beautiful sky. To see it with her natural eyes was alluring in every way.

Doug was in his room when she got home. They were staying at her grandparents' house until they could afford one of their own. She stayed in her mother's old room, careful not to touch anything. It had been left just the way it was the day she died- the day Breanna was born. Though she'd never say it out loud, she'd always felt responsible for it. Although, she couldn't have decided to be born. It just happened.

But she didn't want to think about that. She put her backpack on the floor and entered the guest room. "Hey, Daddy."

Doug looked up from his art pad and smiled. "How was your first day back?" She explained everything that happened, not because it was interesting, but because she knew he loved hearing her voice after the long years it had been altered by technology. "Any homework?"

Breanna nodded. "A little. I should be done within an hour, though."

The work was easy. It was easy, but she hated doing it. She thought back to the days she used to love science, to feel it was the only thing that mattered in the word, the only thing that could never betray her. She'd given up everything for it. But now that she saw how much it could ruin lives, she'd lost all faith in it. She'd come out of that AI a different person.

The sound of a melody penetrated the door, and, curious, she set her book down and went downstairs to investigate. There she saw her father at the old grand piano, playing out a simple tune. Without a word, she sat on the bench beside him and played a piece she remembered from a long time ago. Doug recognised the song right away and sang quietly along.

"_Oh, my love_

_My darling,_

_I've hungered for your touch_

_A long, lonely time"_

Breanna picked up where he left off seamlessly.

"_And time goes by_

_So slowly_

_And time can do so much_

_Are you still mine?..."_

When the song was over, Doug pulled her to him. It was perfect. It was what he'd wanted for so long. Her sweet alto voice seemed to hang in the air, and he longed for it to stay there forever. "Breanna..." He said her name just to feel it on his lips. For thirty-three years he couldn't call her that. To be able to say that name, to see that face that looked so much like her mother's was all he needed. If he were to die right then, his only worry would be for her, how she would cope.

His memory often went back to their days being held captive at Aperture. It had been Hell on Earth, the first two years especially. The first two years, he was alone. He had been ready to give up. To turn himself in to her, but it was as if fate had wanted to rescue him. He'd found his daughter, even if she hadn't found herself.

But that was the past. He'd abandoned his late uncle's facility. The only reason he'd returned was for Breanna- to put her back in her body. And he'd made a vow that he would never go back again.

Not if his life depended on it.

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><p><strong>The songs are <em>Something<em> and _Unchained __Melody_. AKA Not mine. So, no copyright stuff.**


	2. Chapter 2: Fight

The first day of June, a Thursday night, upon coming home from school, Breanna asked a question she'd never had to before.

"Daddy, can I go to the movies with a friend tonight?"

Doug looked up, genuinely surprised. She'd always been so much like himself, never truly having a friend. But, just as his mother had done, he kept his feelings to himself. "And who might that be?"

She blushed ever so slightly. "He's from school. I met him in Biology. His name is West."

"A boy, huh?"

"Yes..."

"And when you say you'll be going to the movies, will you actually be watching the movie?"

"Daddy!" She laughed. "It's not like that! We're just friends." She seemed just a little hesitant in her words.

He smiled and simply looked at her for a moment. My baby girl is growing up... "I guess it's alright. But I want to meet him, first." She thanked him with a hug and a kiss on the cheek before running upstairs to her room.

She hadn't been this happy in years. She was excited to see how much theatres had changed since the last time she'd gone. Everything had changed so much. The first time she'd laid eyes on her iPod, she'd been entranced. She simply couldn't believe such a small device could hold 4gb of information. It was silly, if she thought about it, being in such wonder over a music player when she'd spent the past three decades as a machine.

In all honesty, she hated thinking about those days. It terrified her to be reminded of how much she'd hurt her father. And how absolutely terrifying and painful the process was. At first she'd been nothing, just a piece of metal with no emotions. But after another procedure, she'd begun to adapt, to feel closer to being human.

She stood before her mirror, looking herself in the face. Cryogenic storage had kept her from dying from that childhood accident, but the insomnia was coming back. She would lay in bed for hours before finally drifting off, only to wake up at least three times a night. I'll have to try out that concealer I got the other day...

She wanted to look nice, but she didn't want to look too nice. West- Such an unusual name. She really liked it- could see it as flirting. But, was she flirting? She didn't know, really. She shook it off as she began brushing her hair out.

The young man knocked at the door at exactly 7:00. Doug greeted him, West introducing himself, as well.

"I'll be down in just a minute!" Breanna called from her room.

Doug smiled at her voice. "She's been getting ready for well over an hour. It's been a long time since she's been out anywhere." He invited the boy in.

Never really one for making conversation, West looked around for anything to talk about to Breanna's father. He eventually wandered over to the mantel, where a framed photograph stood, reflecting days long since passed. "Dr. Rattmann, is this you?"

Doug looked over at the photo of the two smiling men. "At one point, yes, it was."

"And that man you're with... You knew Cave Johnson?"

The boy's enthusiasm made Doug smile. "I did. In fact, he was my uncle." Doug cherished his reaction.

"A- are you serious?" Doug nodded. "My uncle worked at Aperture up past when Mr. Johnson died. Until he died, that is... I never met him, though."

Doug knew for a fact how this boy's relative had died. He'd been murdered. "What was his name? I worked there, too, I might have known him."

"Michael Anderson."

The name seemed to hang in the air. Michael Anderson. Doug could have sworn for a moment he saw the man with the blonde hair and dark-rimmed glasses standing behind West. After a few long seconds, Doug stormed over to the front door and opened it wide. "Get out."

"What?"

"Get out!" West hurried out the door just as Breanna was coming back down the stairs, her hair parted neatly down the middle, with her best clothes and makeup on.

Her eyes darted from her father to the boy running down the street. "Daddy! What the hell was that?"

Doug closed the door slowly as he replied. "H- his uncle... He's the one who hurt you..." He looked at her, his strange pupils filled with more sorrow than anger.

Breanna's eyes met his. "Why should that matter? I told you, it was an accident! He didn't mean to!"

"If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have been without you for thirty-three years! I don't want you associated with anyone related to him!" His voice became just a little louder with each sentence.

"I'm technically in my late forties, I think I should have some say in who I can hang out with!" She shot back.

"I'm sure your mother-"

"Mom is dead!" She herself could barely believe she'd said such a thing. After a long, emotional silence, Breanna stormed back upstairs. Even from the living room, Doug heard her shout. "I hate you!" It was their first argument.

She regretted it. She really did. She'd hurt him, she could see it in his face. It wasn't the first time. She'd hurt him when she'd chosen to be uploaded into that prototype all those years ago. Why, she hadn't even said goodbye. Her words still rang in her head. Mom is dead... Mom is dead, and it's all my fault. It's... It's always been my fault... Ever since the beginning...

She didn't speak to him the next morning. It wasn't because she was angry. She was ashamed. More so than she'd ever been in her entire, extended life. Around 8:00 that morning, about two hours after she'd left, he got a phone call that would change multiple lives forever. "Dr. Rattmann, I'm calling on behalf of the high school. I'm just verifying that you're aware Breanna isn't in school today."

"She... She what?"


	3. Chapter 3: Vanished

"Sh- she left for school this morning like usual. I- I could never imagine her sk- skipping." Doug was seated on the couch, Nathan and Lillian Dasley- Breanna's grandparents- on either side of him, equally worried.

A police officer scribbled some things down in her notebook. "And did you two get in an argument at all that might have made her want to leave?"

That hit him hard. _Could... Could this really be my fault...? _What if she_ had _run away? He'd been without her for so long. How would he bare to do it again? "Y- yes. I- I wouldn't let her go out with a b- boy I didn't tr- trust." His hands shook as they grasped each other. How could this happen? How could he_ let _this happen? He'd vowed he'd be a good father, that he would make her life the best possible. But he'd failed. She was missing, maybe dead. _Could this really be my fault...?_

After writing a bit more, the officer stood up. "Thank you, Dr. Rattmann. We'll do everything we can to bring her home." He would have expressed his appreciation, but he'd begun sobbing too strongly for words.

Mrs. Dasley held Doug close to her. "We'll get her back, Douglas. We'll get her back."

Her husband stayed silent. He would never admit it, but that girl meant the world to him. He'd been so devastated when he thought she was dead. But she'd come back then. And now that she was gone again, what would he do? What would any of them do?

Doug sat alone in his room for a long time. Exactly how long he couldn't say, but it seemed like a horrifying, lonely eternity. Mr. and Mrs. Dasley had gone to the police station. The house was so empty. All he could do was stare at the wall as the grandfather clock in the corner struck five.

_The five chimes turning to gunshots..._

_Daddy...!_

He flew to his feet. Blood on the walls of the room, on his hands. Doug's eyes shot around wildly as he staggered back.

_Daddy...! Help m-_

_The slamming of a car door outside turning to another shot..._

"N- no... No! Breanna!" It was too much. He couldn't take it. "No, not my Breanna! Don't kill my baby!" His mind was flooded with images, all of them terrible. It didn't take long for his knees to go weak and cause him to fall to the ground, screaming her name for hours on end before he finally cried himself to sleep.

"Douglas! Douglas, wake up!" He opened his eyes slowly to the sight of Mrs. Dasley kneeling beside him. "Douglas..."

He could only stare at her for a moment as he regained his sense of reality. Sitting up, he looked at his hands, which, to his horror, had a thin layer of blood in some spots. He only determined the source when he finally became aware of the pain in his arms. They were scratched, fingernail marks dug into the skin. The same could be said for his temples and palms. "My little girl..." He broke out into a new round of sobs.

Mrs. Dasley embraced him yet again. "Let's get you cleaned up."

He took a long shower, but still he felt as though he were drenched in blood. His eyes in the mirror were hopeless, broken. "Breanna... I'm sorry... I'm sorry..." He wiped a tear from where it had fallen to his cheek and took the bottle of his medication from the medicine cabinet. Why should he even bother? Without it, he heard he voice, he saw her face.

_You didn't take your medication today, did you...?_

That settled it. To hear his daughter say that just as she did four months prior to her transfer, with all its concern and fear, it nearly killed him. He took the pills, only because he knew that's what she would want him to do.

He'd lost her before. But at least he'd known she was in Aperture. Now, now she could be anywhere. She could be in a different county, a different state. Or she could be just next door. But the police would find her, right? Her face was all over the news. And besides, they had to. It was their job. _Just like it was my job to save Uncle Johnson. My job to keep her safe..._

Where was she? Was she hurt? Was she even alive? Just the possibility of her being dead scared Doug to no end. _What would Cassy say if she knew I'd let our girl disappear? He couldn't help but look upwards. I'm a terrible father. I'd have been a terrible husband, too. _Her smile, the way her blue eyes lit up when she heard even a simple melody; Would he ever see either of those again? "Don't hurt her..." He whispered. "Please... Just don't hurt her... She's all I have left..."

Meanwhile, in a darkened room of an undisclosed location, a terror-stricken girl again made an attempt at breaking her bonds. The window on the other side of the room, with its bars on the inside and cardboard covering, taunted her, as if saying "You're so close to the outside and there's nothing you can do". She tried her best to get as far away as possible from the trap door when she heard his footsteps. When he entered up the wooden ladder, she saw the glint of what was in his hand and couldn't help but give a little whimper in fear. He smiled at her helplessness. When the knife penetrated her skin, her scream of pain was muffled by the gag in her mouth.

It was three days later that Doug's newly purchased prepaid cellphone rang. "Hello?"

"Dr. Rattmann, this is Officer Mason from the local police station. We're going to need you to stop by as soon as possible."

"D- did you figure something out?"

"Maybe. Dr. Rattmann... We need you to identify a body for us."


	4. Chapter 4: The Man In The BlueGrey Suit

In a way, it was a good thing. The body hadn't been his Breanna. So there was a chance she was still alive. But he still didn't know where she was, and there was still a girl laying there dead and unidentified.

He walked back to the house slowly, his eyes trailing the ground. Each minute that passed made it less and less likely for him to ever be able to see her again, that she would survive through this. He needed to rest his mind, so he sat on a bench in the centre of town, his head in his hands. It was too much. This was the sort of thing you heard on T.V. Something that happened to someone else. But here he was, scared and confused, with no idea of where his daughter was.

"You have had a troubling few days, haven't you, Doctor Rattmann?" Doug's head shot up at this new, raspy voice. It was slow and calm, almost frighteningly so, and, though he hadn't noticed anyone sit on the bench, it can from right next to him. "I can assure you, the body you just saw has no relation to _din_... _kärlek_."

The man with the blue-grey suit had a briefcase sitting on his lap, his piercing eyes causing something in the back of Doug's mind to feel something about him just wasn't right. "W- who are you?"

The man, instead of answering, simply neglected his question. "You are a very... innnteresting... Person, Doctor Rattmann. I highly admire your work. For example... Your designsss." He gave a barely noticeable smirk. His voice, the way he paused in the middle of sentences, the way he occasionally put emphasis on the wrong syllables of words, the way he slowed down and sped up at random, it was terrifying. "It'sss just a shame it could not have been completed earlier. There could have been a large amount of trouble avoided. Had your uncle been able to sssee it, I am sure he wold have been very pleased."

"H- how do you know about that?"

"Our... Benefactorsss... Have been watching you for longer than you know. Though, with your... Condition... There is a chance you mmmay have... Realized at one point or another, but simply passssed it off as a delusion. But I don't want to get too far ahead of myself." He adjusted his tie, his demeanour still suspiciously cool. "You, being the lone sssurvivor of the... Incident... At Aperture, must have seen a great deal of things others could only immmagine. Tell me, do you find it odd, Doctor Rattmann, that only one body wasss recovered from that day? I have been informed... That Doctor Annnderson was found dead only a few months after she was. A coincidence, perhaps?"

"A- and who t- told you that?"

There was a pause. "I'm really not at liberty to say. But the answer to all our questions lllay close to home. And sometimesss, you need to look beyond... The scratches in the glassss."

Doug moved as far down the bench as he could to put distance between them. Once in a while, a person would walk by, giving him a look he'd known all too well in his life. It was a look that said "Who is he talking to?". _It's like they can't see him... _It made sense now. He was imagining this, that was all. He reached in his pocket, but quickly realized its contents were gone.

"Looking for thessse?" The man had Doug's bottle of medication in his hand. "Honestly, Doctor Rattmann, you think they wore off so quickly?"

Doug looked from his pocket, to the bottle, to the man's eyes. "Wh- who the hell are you?"

His face was unreadable as he placed the bottle in his briefcase. "My, my. Ssstill paranoid, are we? Well, after what you have been through, I can unnnderstand. Strange how... Something from so long ago can still have an affffect on a person in the present." The man stood, dusted off his suit jacket, and uttered one last cryptic message, a small, frightening grin on his lips. "The right man in the wrong place can make all the diff-erence in... The world."

He turned a corner into an alleyway. The moment he was out of sight, Doug hurried after him. "W- wait!" But as soon as he looked, the man was no where to be found. The only sign of his presence was the little orange pill bottle laying on the ground. Doug searched for the better part of twenty minutes, but found nothing. _But... It's a dead end... _He thought._ There's nowhere he could have gone... It's like he just... Vanished..._

Another day being held captive. He'd found her untied, and she'd paid dearly for her actions. There had been one good thing to come out of when he'd stabbed her in the hand three days prior. He hadn't taken back the knife. She hoped with all her heart her father would see her clue. What was he doing right now? In all honesty, she was more worried for him than herself. He could break at any moment. He was so fragile already. And her grandfather had been so furious when he'd thought she was dead. Now that she was gone again, would he ever forgive her father, even if she _did_ get out? She'd only closed her eyes for a moment, but when she opened them again, there was a stranger in what looked like a blue-grey business suit directly opposite her on the other side of the room.

In his hand, he gripped a briefcase, though he never opened it. And those eyes. It was the eyes that did it. They seemed almost to see into her, to see what she was feeling, what she thought.

He grinned at her- not quite friendly, but not exactly menacing, either. "Your time will... Arrive again soonnn, Miss Rattmann. Very, very soon."

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><p><strong>Thanks to Jon for helping me write the G-Man. I haven't gotten to play Half-Life yet, so I didn't know much about him. :)<strong>


	5. Chapter 5: Min Kärlek

She wasn't going to make it through the day. She didn't know how she knew that, but she did. She'd beaten the odds for this long already. She was all but drained of hope.

"Your time will... Arrive again soonnn, Miss Rattmann. Very, very soon."

Her time. Who was that man? How had he gotten in? And how had he known her name, or that she'd died once before? Unless he wasn't referring to her death...

She couldn't move. She was tied down so tightly. It seemed to her a terrifying reminder of that day- that fateful day- on which she gave up her human body for a chance at eternity. The day that hurt her father more than anything she'd ever done.

The gag in her mouth reduced her voice to nothing but an incoherent mumble, but what she wanted to say more than anything escaped her lips as best it could. "I'm sorry, Daddy..."

"Dr. Rattmann!" Doug, who was still shaken up from his encounter only minutes before, instantaneously turned his head back, somewhat afraid of who would be behind him.

The familiar woman of about his age was in a yellow blouse and tight jeans. "M- Miss Maken..." He could barely speak. He could hear the news reports in the back of his mind.

_Fifteen-year-old Breanna Rattmann went missing three days ago after leaving for school..._

_She was last seen wearing a pink corset-style top and jeans..._

_Police say her father and grandparents are not suspects..._

She caught up to him, her brown hair in a braid falling down her back. "I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am. I can't imagine what you've been going through." Doug simply shook his head and sighed. "If you ever need anything- help with anything, or just someone to talk to- you can trust me. I really want to help you in any way I can."

He smiled. Just a little, but the first time in days. "I appreciate that. It... Means a lot."

Miss Maken put a supportive hand on his arm. "And her mother... Is she... In the picture...?"

"Breanna's mother... Cassy... Died in childbirth." He removed eye contact with the woman in front of him. "We'd been friends as children- The only friend I'd ever had. When our paths finally crossed again, years later, we realized that we'd never stopped loving each other. I proposed to her after she told me she was pregnant. But then, when it came time for the baby..." He trailed off.

Miss Maken, whose eyes were filled with sorrow, could think of only one thing to say. "I... I'm so sorry..."

Again, Doug shook his head. "Breanna, she blames herself. She's never said it out loud before, but I know she does. She's so strong. She's been through so much..." He didn't go into the details. She wouldn't have believed him. "Cassy spoke Swedish. She had a nickname for me, which I passed to Breanna in her honour." He kept a tear from spilling onto his face as he said it. "_Min kärlek_. 'My love'."

"That's beautiful..." She meant it. It really was.

He felt his hands begin to tremble. "I'm so scared for her... She could be lost, or hurt. Or..." He stopped not only because of fear to suggest her demise, but also because of what he saw. He whispered something Miss Maken couldn't quite make out.

"What was that?"

"_Min kärlek_... I... I know where she is." He began bolting across the street, Miss Maken close behind him, just as a certain teenage boy exited his house. Doug addressed him aggressively. "Where is she?"

West looked at each of them, obviously startled. "Where's who?"

"Where is she? Where is my daughter?" It took everything he had not to throw the boy to the ground.

"Wh- why would you think I know? D- do you think I did something to her?" His face turned from panic to sorrow. "I... I love her... Even though she doesn't love me back. I would _never_ hurt her." Though his voice seemed sincere, Doug couldn't believe it.

He raised his voice even further. "Then how do you explain that?" His arm rose, pointing at a window on West's house. It was on the third story, presumably the attic. Though it seemed there was cardboard covering it on the inside, there were two words visible, in a familiar handwriting, seemingly carved hastily into the glass with a knife. "'_Min kärlek_'!She wrote that! She's in there, I know it!"

West's eyes locked on the phrase. "He... He couldn't have..." There was a small, anxious pause before he continued. "Follow me! Quick!" They ran around the back, West opening the shed with a key hidden under one of the stepping stones. He emerged with a pocket knife and a hunting rifle. "Dr. Rattmann, take this." He handed Doug the gun. "I don't know what he'll do. He could try and kill us. I just hope we're not too late."

Doug looked to the lone female in the group. "You stay here. It's too dangerous."

There was no warning. None of them could have predicted it. But it happened. It came right out of the blue. She kissed him. Long and hard, as a woman would if her husband were going to war. Doug was at a loss for words. "M- Miss Maken..."

"Please," She whispered. "Call me Leena."

"Leena..."

She pulled him in so her lips were less than an inch from his ear. "Now go. Go get that brilliant girl of yours back. Just be careful."

Still speechless, he could only nod before following West into the house.

They had to stay quiet. He- whoever "He" was- was still home. They just had to find the girl and run. The silence was deafening. Their heartbeats thundered, their steps seemed to echo off every wall. _What if we're too late? _Doug though. _What if she's already... gone?_

"West?" Doug's thoughts were interrupted by a new voice from behind them. "West, what's going on? Who's this?"

"Where is she?" The boy asked, his tone both cool and demanding.

"What are you talking about?"

"Dad, you tell me where she is." He became more serious as he raised the knife just a little higher.

Thomas Anderson sighed. "I guess there's no use hiding it anymore."

West's grasp on the weapon began to weaken. "Why...? How could you...?"

"You don't understand, West!" Thomas's mood changed abnormally quickly. He then turned to Doug, a look of pure hatred on his face. "Thirty-three years ago, I got a phone call from Michael. He'd been in love with a woman. He'd loved her more than anything else in the world. But then _you_ showed up." He pulled his own gun out of his back pocket and turned the safety off. "You killed her. And then she killed him."

Doug still didn't understand. "He- He was in love with Caroline? But, I- I didn't kill her! I didn't want to do it! Mr. Johnson made me!"

The gun was now pointed at Doug's chest. "You could have said it was a failure! That you couldn't do it! The day he died, I swore that if I ever saw you, I would make you pay. And one day, there I was, just looking over some papers for work, and West tells me there's a pretty new girl in his class. One Breanna Rattmann. You can imagine how shocked I was when this girl, though she was born in- what, 1972?- was still only fifteen years old?"

"What are you talking about?" West's voice was quiet, frightened.

Thomas gave no acknowledgment to his son. "There was only one explanation I could think of. And after some... Interrogation... She told me I was right. Of course, she wasn't completely cooperative, so she had to be punished." He pulled a pocket knife out of his pocket and flipped it open. Doug just about collapsed when he saw that the blade was coated in dried blood.

He couldn't take it anymore. He held up the gun, his finger on the trigger. "What have you done to my daughter, you son of a bitch?"

"I'm going to teach you what it's like to lose a loved one." The man gave a wicked grin. "My brother for your daughter. Seems fair to me, don't you think, Dr. Rattmann? Really, it favours you more than me. After all, you mustn't care for her much, what to have turned her into a robot for more than thirty years." West openly expressed his confusion, but Doug didn't hear him.

It was almost too painful to think about. The images from years long since passed flashed before Doug's eyes as he closed them, weeping despite his better judgment. The first time he'd ever seen her, her eyes bright blue even minutes after her birth. Growing up, playing in the yard. Coming home from school, singing for him. At Aperture, doing homework in the break rooms. Her lifeless body laying strapped down on a metal table, wires attached to her, the blue eyes frozen in time. Her-

There was a gunshot, and he hadn't been the one to pull the trigger. His eyes flew open, just in time to see Leena throw Thomas to the ground, hitting his head hard enough to be knocked unconscious. There was now a bullet hole in the opposite wall. "Go! Find her! We may not have much time!" They didn't hesitate to obey her.

They tore the house apart, calling her name._ What if she can't respond? What if she can't respond because she's already dead?_

They'd split up, Doug was all alone in the back of the hall. Then he saw it. The trap door in the ceiling.

She hadn't heard the commotion downstairs, as she'd been sobbing too hard, her mind busy being scared for her life. But now she heard footsteps, saw the light come in through the trap door, heard the squeak of a man's weight on the old wood ladder. This was it. She was going to die.

Though her eyes were terrified, they still gave off a silent message. "If you even dare to touch me, I'll make sure you regret it for the rest of your life." But once she saw the familiar face, her threatening gaze immediately transformed, her tear-stained cheeks being dampened again, this time from joy, relief, a feeling of hope.

Doug let out a sound that resembled both a sob and a laugh simultaneously before calling to the others. "I found her!" And then softer, as if to himself and the girl before him. "I found her... I found her..."

She was tied to an old wooden chair, ropes around her neck, upper torso, waist, and legs. Her wrists were bound to the arms of the chair tightly. As he began frantically freeing her, he saw the wound on her left hand; a gash that went all the way through from the back to her palm, about the width of a pocket knife. Among that were various other scrapes and bruises.

At last, her helped her remove the piece of light blue cloth that had been tied around her head and shoved into her mouth, allowing her to give a heart-wrenching sob. Weak from lack of food and sleep, as well as an overload of fear and emotion, he had to assist her in standing, half holding her up as they held each other. He ran his hand over the spots where the rope around her neck had rubbed away portions of skin, but as he hit one area in particular, she gave something that was just short of a cry of agony.

He looked, and there on the back of her neck, right where it turned to her upper back, was a very neatly done tattoo, still red and blistered, of the Aperture Science logo. An everlasting reminder of what she'd had to go through for more than three decades.

They hadn't even noticed Leena and West enter, but neither the woman nor the boy uttered a sound, despite both wanting more information on the whole "Robot" issue.

That is, until they were thrown down the stairs.

Thomas, knife in hand, lunged for Breanna, her father's hand catching his wrist just in time. Doug, having been undernourished for so long, struggled to keep the attacker away. "Breanna! Go! Go, _min kärlek_, I'll be fi-" His words were cut off by a particularly violent blow to the chest. He crumpled to the ground, the same blade that had pierced his daughter's hand hovering over his throat.

Thomas gave a triumphant smirk. "If only Michael could see me now. Revenge is a dish best served steaming hot, Dr. Rattmann."

Had he been aware of the girl behind him, things would have turned out much differently. The bullet from the rifle previously held by Doug shot into his arm, the knife clattering to the floor. Another shot, into his leg this time. But nothing fatal. She couldn't kill a man. Not even this one. Breanna kneeled down next to her father, tears in her eyes as her world slowly faded into blackness.

The wedding was lavish. For the first time, Doug had someone to call his wife. And for the first time, Breanna, the girl with the scar on her hand and tattoo on her neck, had someone to talk to when only a woman would do. West went off to live with his mother- who, luckily, lived only a few towns over- while Thomas was in jail. But Breanna wouldn't let him leave. Not without giving him a present to say thank you.

For both of them, it had been their first kiss.

* * *

><p><strong>I lied, okay! There's gonna be ONE more and that is IT!<strong>


End file.
